Pray continually. 1 Thessalonians 5:17 NIV.
Prayer is the communication link between men and God and a powerful way of communicating with our Father; The Supreme Being – God and the Creator of the Universe. It is the powerful key God has given unto us to speak with him and to unlock deep mysteries.
Little wonder Christ Jesus had to start his earthly ministry with prayer and ends it with prayer.
We read books on prayer, we talk about it, we ask for prayer from time to time but somehow, someway, we are not receiving answers to our prayers.
The disciples also had this same experience. They do pray but they were not seeing results and they had to ask Jesus to teach them how to pray [Luke 11:1-4, Matthew 6:9-13] because effective prayer has a pattern that must be followed.
The function of prayer is not to influence God, but rather to change the nature of the one who prays [Romans 12:2, Malachi 3:6]. After being taught how to pray by Jesus, they [the disciples] no longer pray without seeing results and it became there lifestyle.
The devil fears any man that can go on his knees to offer prayers unto God because he knows that such a man’s prayer avails much [James 5:16b] and it makes the dynamic power of God available and that’s why he do make sure that he attacks the prayer life of the Christians first by making it look like prayer is a difficult thing to do and to be consistent with before launching any of his attacks.
Just as the Apostle Paul says that, “If he doesn’t preach the gospel of Christ Jesus, he is doomed [1 Corinthians 9:16]”. Prayer should also be our lifestyle and way of life.